Before we get started with this week’s Twitter Mailbag, permit me a few words about Brian Stann, whose retirement announcement came a little too late to spawn questions for the TMB.

I admit that when Stann first mentioned to me that he thought he was done fighting, I didn’t quite believe it. Usually how it happens with fighters is they think that for a while, maybe say it out loud, but need a couple more fights before they really believe it themselves. Sometimes they make the announcement too soon, then start second-guessing themselves in the months and years to come. I could be wrong, but after talking to him about his decision and the reasons for it, I really don’t think Stann will be one of those guys.

As anyone who’s had a conversation with him knows, he’s about as intelligent, articulate, and thoughtful a person as you could ever hope to find in this business. He’s honest and honorable without being naive. He has the willful optimism that fighters need, but he’s also realistic with himself about his abilities and his options.

It probably says something about this sport that when Stann formally announced his retirement, it came as a relief to many. Here was a guy who seemed to be getting out in time. Here was a man who had the good sense to worry about what fighting for a living might be doing to his brain, and the fact that he could approach the decision so reasonably and rationally shows what a good brain he has to protect.

Now on to this week’s questions …

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@benfowlkesMMA silvas method worked well in the past but not so much this time, is there a place in the sport for this type of strategy #tmb

I get a little annoyed at the suggestion that Silva’s clowning around was nothing but an unsuccessful strategy. As if the only chance Silva had against Weidman was to bait him into charging face-first into a punch. As if, had he kept his hands near his face and tried to simply outfight the challenger, he would have been easily smashed. I don’t think for one second that Silva saw the fight that way, and neither should we. I think he did that stuff in part because he wanted to encourage Weidman to do something dumb, but also because he thought he could get away with it. He didn’t take Weidman seriously enough. He didn’t think this was someone who could make him pay for screwing around within punching range, and he soon found out he was wrong.

Is there a place for that strategy? Sure, if you can make it work. People point to past fights where Silva knocked out opponents after convincing them to come lunging into the trap, but they forget that in those fights, he eventually threw some serious punches back. Against Weidman, he didn’t do much of anything, aside from tossing out a few leg kicks just to show that he could. Silva approached that fight as if he knew they were going to be there all night, so he had plenty of time to unleash his attack. Then he got knocked out before he got the chance, reminding him that he’s more mortal than he might have allowed himself to believe at times.

@benfowlkesMMA if this is the passing of the torch, and we are in The Weidman Era, does he have what it takes to become a star / PPV draw?

Don’t you even start with that Weidman Era stuff, Kevin. Have you learned nothing from following this sport? You start talking that way now, the MMA gods will see to it that Weidman spends the next 18 months sidelined with an injury or something. It’s like you’re trying to ensure that he gets distracted by a supporting role on a new FOX sitcom.

As for the meat of your question – does Weidman have what it takes to become an MMA star and pay-per-view draw – I think the jury’s still out. I won’t lie to you, he’s not the most charismatic or verbose individual I’ve ever talked to. He seems like a nice enough guy. He’s definitely a talented fighter. Still, he doesn’t seem to have that ineffable star quality. Not yet, anyway. His rematch with Anderson Silva – and yes, unless one of them drops dead or gets his own late-night talk show in the next few months, that’s going to happen – will do huge pay-per-view numbers. But if Weidman’s still the champ after that? Let’s just say I don’t see him challenging for Georges St-Pierre‘s crown as the “king of pay-per-view” any time soon.

@benfowlkesMMA What’s more likely to happen: Anderson SIlva admitting to throwing the fight or Bob Arum admitting MMA as a legit sport?

Let’s talk about these fight-fixing “allegations,” shall we? And I put allegations in quotes there because I haven’t heard anyone make that claim seriously, with any evidence or even a reasonable explanation to back it up. It’s mostly coming from people who a) can’t believe Anderson Silva could possibly be beaten by Chris Weidman, or b) generally favor the most complex conspiracy theory of an explanation for any unusual event, like they’re operating according to some sort of reverse Occam’s razor.

Why would the UFC want to fix this fight so Silva would lose? What, just so the rematch would sell? If Silva had won, the UFC was looking at the possibility of dual superfights, either against welterweight champ Georges St-Pierre, light heavyweight champ Jon Jones, or both. Hell, even Roy Jones Jr. was a possibility before this. Why throw all those potential blockbusters away just to do Silva-Weidman II?

Also, if you’re going to fix a fight in MMA, you don’t do it by letting the other guy smash your jaw with a left hook, then bounce your head off the canvas with follow-up blows. You do it by getting caught in a submission, just like the heel hooks and kneebars Silva fought off in the first round. If he’d wanted to throw the fight, he could have just tapped right then. It would have fit with people’s notions about Weidman being good with submissions and with Silva being vulnerable to the heel hook (it is, after all, the move that accounts for his last real loss before this fight). There’s just no way Silva would decide to fix a fight by getting knocked out. It’s way too dangerous, and also much harder to fake convincingly.

The point is, if you’re one of those people calling this a fix, stop it. You probably don’t even really believe it yourself. You probably just think it’d be fun to put on the tinfoil hat and shout stuff. Or maybe you do really believe it, perhaps because there is something wrong with your brain. Either way, dude, knock it off. Fight-fixing is a serious allegation, one that could cast a long, ugly shadow over the whole sport, and one that will always be somewhat of a threat in a sport where you really only have to pay off one person (not mention a person who may or may not be satisfied with his current level of compensation). Don’t go throwing those accusations around where they don’t belong, because you only make it harder for people to keep an eye out for the real thing if and when and where it actually does happen.

@benfowlkesMMA Leben is one of the most exciting of all time to watch – but will his Zombie-like style leave him a zombie after retirement?

A lot depends on when he retires. As Dana White said, Leben’s style isn’t the healthiest. At the same time, without that style does anyone really think he would have lasted in the UFC as long as he has, especially with all his problems outside the cage? Fighters like Leben strike a certain bargain. They promise us an entertaining sort of destruction – their own or someone else’s – and in return we promise not to care quite as much as we usually do about wins and losses. That buys a fighter a little extra time in the short term, but it forces him to sacrifice longevity over the long run. It is not a style that ages well. Against Andrew Craig at UFC 162, we saw a Leben who looked the same as he’d ever been, only a little less so. He plodded forward with that left hand wrecking ball at the ready. He absorbed blow after blow on that enormous melon of his, which loomed like a pleasingly stationary target for his opponent. It was even painted bright red, just in case Craig had trouble locating it. Leben says he’s got his life together these days. I hope he does, but I don’t see it leading to a career resurgence in the UFC. The question is whether he’ll be able to make peace with that, or whether he’ll insist on fighting on and risking all the dangers that Brian Stann just retired in order to avoid.

@benfowlkesMMA The Weidman/Silva aftermath seems similar to after Edgar/Penn 1. Can CW be an effective champion until they fight again? #TMB

I don’t think it’s all that similar, if only because there’s no doubt who won the Weidman-Silva bout. It was the guy who didn’t end the fight flat on his back, trying to grab ahold of Herb Dean’s leg. With Frankie Edgar‘s first decision win over B.J. Penn, the outcome was at least debatable, if not downright controversial. They needed a rematch just to give them both five more rounds to figure it out. Weidman knocked Silva out while the former champ was in the midst of doing his best MC Hammer impression, so the only question is whether Silva could do better if he did more punching and less posing in the rematch. In the meantime, yeah, Weidman can be a perfectly effective champion, whatever that means. It’s not as if being the UFC middleweight champ comes with a lot of complex day-to-day duties, aside from signing autographs and maybe hawking some cell phones or protein powder.

@benfowlkesMMA dana says no to slc forever. It was a bad card on a Sunday, in Utah. I think its a little harsh. Thoughts?

If you’re asking whether we’ll ever find out exactly how much the UFC pulls in each year and how much of that it pays out to fighters, I doubt it. The UFC prefers to keep its numbers private most of the time, so unless a fighter union materializes (which seems doubtful) or the UFC undergoes some major changes in its corporate culture (equally doubtful), it seems unlikely that we’ll get to comb through Zuffa’s books any time soon.

But you’re right to zero in on revenue here, since that’s the big, unanswered question when it comes to fighter pay. It’s not just how much the UFC is paying its fighters, but what percentage of the overall pie they’re getting. UFC President Dana White says people don’t realize what it costs to build a sport, what with offices in different countries staffed with capable, competent people. At the same time, the glimpses we get of White’s life in video blogs and such make it seem like he’s not letting overhead costs eat into his take-home pay too much. No one’s saying UFC fighters should make NFL money if the UFC is really pulling in MLS money. Bankrupting the biggest organization in the sport wouldn’t serve anyone’s long-term goals. But until we know what percentage of the profits fighters are making, we’ll never know whether it’s fair.

It’s probably a little of all of that and more, to be honest. For one thing, refs in MMA are more visible, more a part of the action. With two fighters and one ref per bout, it’s the rare sport where there are almost as many officials as athletes in action at one time. It’s also the rare sport where, at any time, the ref may be called upon to make a decision that will end the entire contest. That makes for a very tough job, and it also makes it easy for fans and fighters to immediately tell who was to blame in the event of a bad call.

@benfowlkesMMA who do you see as ‘next in line’ for the featherweight title after TKZ? Where do Edgar, Swanson, Guida, Lamas & Mendez sit?

The great thing about featherweight right now is the wealth of options. It took a couple years to get here, but the UFC now has a thriving 145-pound division that’s producing great fights and quality contenders. The original plan was to have Anthony Pettis challenge for Jose Aldo‘s title while Ricardo Lamas and Chan Sung Jung (also known as “The Korean Zombie” or, if you must, “TKZ”) fought each other to determine the No. 1 contender. Then Pettis got hurt, Zombie got the title shot, and the UFC has to figure out what to do with all the other studs in the featherweight class. The good news is, any way you pair them up, you’re bound to get some great fights. Right now though, the next title shot seems like it’s Lamas’ to lose.

@benfowlkesMMA Rogan called weight cutting a “serious problem.” If PED’s are a health/safety issue, isn’t cutting 30lbs even more so? #TMB

It could be, depending on how you do it, but my guess is something terrible is going to have to happen before we’re motivated enough to do anything about it. There are a few different things we could do to discourage drastic weight cuts. We could have them weigh-in the day of the fight rather than the day before, for instance. Or we could weigh them in the day before and the day of, and limit the amount of weight they’re allowed to put on after the initial weigh-in. But changing up the usual routine to that extent would require a serious push, and it’s not going to come from the vague sense that this could go bad eventually. Fighters may be doing all sorts of unpleasant stuff to their bodies with these huge cuts, but at least so far it’s not the kind of stuff that drives headlines and forces people to take action. Until that changes, huge cuts will probably remain the status quo.

Ben Fowlkes is MMAjunkie.com and USA TODAY’s MMA columnist. Follow him on Twitter at @BenFowlkesMMA. Twitter Mailbag appears every Thursday on MMAjunkie.com.

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